Tiger Lilies
by krackensan
Summary: Duo has a secret and Heero is determined to find out what it is. yaoi, 1x2
1. Options

Kracken

Disclamer:I don't own this and I don't make any money off of this.  
Warnings: Male/male sex, violence, language, graphic.

Tiger Lilies

1x2

Options

"So, it's been....three years, two months, and fifteen days since the war, Mr. Maxwell. Any solid plans yet?"

Duo twisted his hands into the front of his blue t-shirt and sunk low in his chair. "I haven't found my... niche yet."

The man sitting behind the desk looked down his nose through a pair of glasses, his hands idly flipping through pages in a file. He had a shock of white hair and a thin, hatchet type face. He reminded Duo too much of Dr. G and his crew. Professionals always gave him the creeps.

"Scrap dealer, delivery man, short career in Preventers, construction, mechanic, programming, and lately... waiter. That wasn't your niche either?" The man looked up and his face was puckered in disapproval.

"Uh, no," Duo replied, remembering the disastrous results. "They're not pressing charges, though."

"That's... good," the man said cautiously. He cleared his throat, took a sip of water from a cup close at hand as if to steady his nerves, and then stamped Duo's file with a red stamp. "I'm afraid that I have to deny benefits, Mr. Maxwell. You are not proving to me that you are serious about finding a meaningful occupation."

Duo blinked, stunned. "How... How'm I going to pay the rent? I was... counting on..."

The man steepled fingers over Duo's file, "Mr. Maxwell, as your social worker, I have given you every opportunity, every lead, every reference within my power. You have blatantly sabotaged my every effort. To put it plainly, it is my opinion that you need motivation that being given a government stipend every month cannot provide."

"But..." Duo struggled to think of an argument. "I'm a veteran. You can't just-"

"Technically, you are not," the man replied cooly. "You were never enrolled in any government force."

"Oh," Duo stood up, dazed.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Maxwell," the man told him, but Duo knew that he wasn't.

"Yeah... I guess...," Duo mumbled, rubbed the back of his neck in confusion, and then gave a dispirited shrug. "Guess I better find some way to make a living."

I need to think this through, Duo thought, as he left the building and took a right into a small park. Lowering himself onto a bench, he slumped down and stared up at the ceiling of L3. "How am I going to finish if I have to hold down a job?"

He pulled out a notebook from his back pocket and pulled a pencil out of his braid. He began sketching a diagram with meticulous care.

"Just a few more months..." he muttered. "That's all I needed."

"Maxwell?" a soft voice exclaimed in surprise. Duo looked up, blinking, and saw Chang Wu Fei standing on the path that lead through the park. He was dressed in a long, black, oriental coat and white pants. His pony tail was as tight as ever and he still possessed the ability to look arrogantly down his nose at everyone around him despite his shorter height.

"Hey, Fei!" Duo said with a slow smile. "Haven't seen you in..." He tied to think and couldn't. "Awhile," he ended lamely. What brings you around here?"

"University Conference," Wu Fei replied, but his surprise had been replaced by confusion and then concern. "Maxwell? You're very pale. Are you well?"

Duo flipped closed his notepad. "I'm fine, Fei, just fine. I was... well, on business... it's great that we managed to run into each other. Did you come into the park to meditate?"

Wu Fei grunted, "No, there's a food stand that sells rice balls down this path. I was getting some for myself and some comrades. Would you like to have some as well? I have time to talk."

"Uh..." Duo floundered. He couldn't think at all.

Wu Fei stepped nearer, head cocking to one side as he narrowed eyes at Duo. "My friend, when is the last time that you slept or had anything to eat?"

Duo pondered those questions without any success. "Dunno," he replied stupidly. His hands gripped his notepad. "I've been... working on something. I sort of... have a deadline...."

"Ah, that derelict ship," Wu Fei guessed, managing to convey some disapproval. "Quatre said something about it. It was only bare metal, with hull breeches every few feet, I was told."

"It has potential... more than that since I've been working on it," Duo replied, resentful.

He shoved his pad into his pants pocket and levered himself off the bench. "Gotta go, Fei. I have to get back on it." He didn't expand on what 'getting back on it' was, but it sounded as if he were going to a job. He wasn't about to admit to Chang Wu Fei that he had been taking Government checks.

"Maxwell," Wu Fei warned and Duo felt hands grip his elbows hard. It wasn't until that moment that he realized that he had almost fallen flat on his face. Wu Fei pushed him back onto the bench and then sat beside him. "You need medical attention."

"No time for that," Duo slurred, but he was leaning heavily against Wu Fei's shoulder. "Gotta finish if I'm going to get my dream."

"Dream?" Wu Fei sighed. "I fail to see how you can have any dream if you don't take care of yourself." He sighed. "Yuy was right."

Duo felt a chill. "Yuy? Heero, you mean? What about?"

"He said that you were idealistic," Wu Fei replied as he pulled out his cell phone and dialed emergency. "He was always confused by it."

"Heero," Duo murmured with a smile as he slowly drifted down into unconsciousness, pillowed on Wu Fei's strong arm. "Should call him."

Wu Fei looked down when Duo's voice trailed off. He blinked. He hadn't known that Duo and Heero were friends. After he called emergency, he told himself, he needed to call Yuy and inform him of his friend's condition. "Damn him for letting Duo get this bad anyway," he grumbled.

"Dehydration, borderline malnutrition; he's under weight by at least fifty pounds. Looks like he was taking stimulants as well." The doctor looked over his computerized chart and then eyed Wu Fei curiously. "He lists you and Quatre Winner as his advocates. Have you noticed any depressed behavior on his part? Any physical complaints?"

Wu Fei frowned and refused to feel guilty. "He's kept himself out of contact with me for some months, but we've never spent any great deal of time together."

"Would Mr. Winner have any information?"

"I don't know," Wu Fei admitted.

The doctor made a frustrated sound. "I'll have to turn him over to the psyche ward then. Since I don't see any medical reason for his condition, it's possible he may be suffering from self neglect."

"I've called a friend who may know more than I do," Wu Fei offered. "Heero Yuy."

The doctor didn't look down at his pad, that familiar with it. "He's not on the list, I can't give him any information, or allow him to see Mr. Maxwell, until he's conscious enough to give his consent."

Wu Fei was confused. "Not on the list? Why..?" He put that aside and asked, "I'm his advocate while he is unconscious, correct?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then I give permission for Heero Yuy to be given any information or access he desires," Wu Fei ordered.

"All right." The doctor handed Wu Fei the pad and he signed the authorization with his thumb print.

"Chang?"

Heero was pushing his way through a crowd in the corridor. He was scowling darkly and dressed in a casual blue shirt and jeans. He eyed the doctor and then confronted Wu Fei. "What's this all about?" he asked. "You didn't say very much in the voice mail you left me."

"Duo is ill," Wu Fe told him. "I met him in a park near here and he collapsed. The doctor says that he has been dangerously neglecting himself. "

Heero looked disturbed at that news. "That doesn't sound like Duo. Nothing ever seemed to get to him. Why did you call me, though?"

"As his friend, I thought..." Wu Fei trailed off at Heero's confused expression, replayed in his mind Duo's words, and then flushed. "I think that I misunderstood something that Duo said. Forgive me for bringing you down here, Yuy."

"I haven't seen Duo since that ceremony at Quatre's, a few months after the war." Heero told him. "I don't know why you would think that we were friends." He turned to the doctor. "Is Duo going to be all right?"

"We have him on an IV and some liquid boosters," the doctor replied. "Once he's stable-"

Heero frowned sharply. "Stable? How serious is he?"

"He's not in any danger," the doctor assured him. "I meant nutritionally stable. Once we have his system pumped up with nutrients and proteins, we'll release him to the psychiatric ward. They'll test him for mental stability. If they clear him, they'll make sure he's given a proper nutritional plan and a case worker to check up on his progress."

"Release him," Heero ordered abruptly.

Wu Fei was as wide eyed as the doctor. "Yuy?"

The doctor raised one, critical eyebrow. "May I ask why?"

Heero growled, waving at the man's computerized pad. "Duo is a grown man. If he wants to starve himself, that's his business."

"If he wishes to be released, once he regains consciousness," The doctor replied primly, "that is his legal choice."

"Or mine, since he has me as his advocate," Wu Fei mused.

Heero was confused again. "Why did you call me if you are such close friends with him?"

"I'm not," Wu Fei admitted, "Though I have seen him more often than you."

"Have him released," Heero told Wu Fei firmly. "He's not a child, he's a Gundam Pilot."

"Perhaps we should speak with him first?" Wu Fei tempered. "He did seem all right when I spoke to him, but it is possible that he may need at least some counseling."

Heero checked his watch and looked as if it annoyed him "I only have twenty minutes before I have to get to a development meeting."

"I was supposed to be at a conference," Wu Fei told him ruefully.

"May I say, sirs," the doctor interjected, "That neither of you seem to know the patient very well. I suggest that you allow the hospital to care for him while you return to your... activities."

"You might, but we're not taking your suggestion," Heero growled back. "Show us where Duo is."

The doctor's face went tight and he nodded as he proceeded them into a side corridor.

It was clear that the doctor was being defensive. Wu Fei didn't blame him. Turning a patient out onto the street, in the dubious care of men who seemed perfect strangers, and who were making it clear that they were going to abandon him there, would have made anyone cautious.

Wu Fei couldn't imagine simply turning Maxwell out onto the street either and he wondered if that was Heero's plan. He tried to find an alternative as they walked and was surprised when Heero muttered, "Duo hated hospitals." He eyed the man and didn't think he was mistaken when he saw concern on Yuy's face. Maybe it wasn't Heero's plan to abandon him either.

"Mr. Maxwell!" The doctor exclaimed and Heero and Wu Fei hurried their steps to follow him into a room.

Duo blushed and turned away as he hitched up and zipped up his pants. His long braid swung at the motion. He already had his shirt on and it was obvious that he was getting ready to make his own escape. The IV lines were out, making bloody splotches on the white sheets of his bed, and a window was open.

"Thanks, doc, for whatever I'm here for, but I'm ready to go now," Duo babbled nervously. He bent to thrust his feet into his shoes.

"Duo?" Wu Fei said and knew that Duo hadn't seen them as he whirled in surprise.

"Hey, Chang!" Duo called back in puzzled delight, but then he frowned, blinked, and sat on the edge of the bed. "Uh... Heero? What..?"

The doctor stepped forward cautiously, put his pad aside on a table, and checked Duo's arms were the IVs had been removed. They had been bandaged with toilet paper, but they weren't bleeding. Duo pulled his arms away and stood again.

"S'okay! I know my way around wounds, doc," Duo grinned wide and gave the man a wink. "Duo Maxwell can take care of himself. Besides, Hospitals make me kind of... nervous."

"Sir, you really should stay and take the full treatment of boosters," the doctor argued. "You became unconscious because of your undernourished condition."

"Oops!" Duo replied sheepishly and rubbed the back of his neck as he backed away. "One too many candy bars, I guess. I'll have to watch that. I promise to drink some orange juice and eat a steak, okay?"

"Sir..." The doctor began to argue again and then sighed. "As you wish, but at least let me prescribe some vitamins and protein enhancers."

"Sounds good, you do that," Duo told him and put his thumb print on a release the man brought up on his pad.

"They will be available at the front counter of the hospital," The doctor told him, but he said it in such a way that it was clear that he believed that Duo would never pick them up.

"Great!" Duo said with false appreciation as he began to walk towards the door. "Thanks!"

Heero and Wu Fei moved aside. Duo looked from Wu Fei and then, almost shyly, he dared a glance at Heero, before looking back at Wu Fei again.

"Guess I made an ass of myself," Duo said in a small voice. "Thanks a lot you guys. I really appreciate you looking out for me, especially..." He darted a minuscule glance at Heero and swallowed hard. "Okay, well, I'll take it from here and not darken your door again... or fall unconscious in it, until invited."

Duo walked past them and pulled a notebook out of his back pocket. Wu Fei could see him making notes with a blunt pencil before he turned a corner and was gone.

Wu Fei blinked, trying to make sense out of what had just happened. His entire day had been turned upside down and then the cause of it had blithely walked out of his life again."I think... I think one of us should go after him."

But Heero was already walking after Duo with long strides, expression intent.

Wu Fei made an exasperated sound. He thought, for a moment that he should follow as well, but then his intelligence finally reasserted itself. It presented him with Heero's look of concern and Duo's shy sideways glances at Heero. It put two and two together and that equation didn't include him.

Wu Fei sighed. "I suppose I have a conference to attend"

"Duo!" Heero caught up with the ex Gundam pilot and fell into step beside him. It was easy. Duo seemed more intent on his notes than on walking.

Duo gave him another of those shy looks and then seemed drawn, almost against his will, back to his notes. Heero studied his profile as they exited the hospital and began walking down the city street. He was thin, Heero noted, and his eyes were shadowed. Other than that, Duo hadn't changed much from when he had been in the war. His shoulders were still well rounded, his chest was strong, his waist was slim, and his legs were still long. Heero had grown more mature looking than Duo, but not taller.

Was Duo married? Did he have a girlfriend now? Heero reasoned that, if Duo had either of those things, they would have been called, not him. Duo had always liked the girls, though, and had always flirted with them. It was something that had kept his one time war comrade in just that particular category; war comrade. After the war, it had seemed logical to distance himself from the man, to let his fascination with the Duo dim with the passing of time.... only it hadn't really dimmed. When Heero had received Wu Fei's message on his voice mail, fear for Duo's health had catapulted him into action. He had paid the exorbitant price for a city cab and had paid the man extra to break a few speeding laws getting to the hospital.

So here he was, with Duo, knowing that he was successfully keeping on his stone wall 'war face', but inside as eager as a boy to stay with Duo as long as he could manage. He tried to see Duo's notes, needing something to say, needing some excuse to keep walking with him. "That's...." Heero remembered then, Quatre telling him about a ship that Duo had been building out on the fringes of the colony. "..your spaceship," Heero ended lamely and then scowled and put his hands in his pockets.

"Yeah," Duo replied absently. "Almost done with it, too. Some more seals... a leeward hatch... some booster rings... some hull plating... oxygen reclamation system... pilot console... anti grav rotators..." he trailed off to scribble some more.

Duo had stated a list that comprised most of a space ship. Heero tried to remember when Quatre had told him about the ship... A year? Longer? If that was so, then Duo hadn't progressed very far.

"Have you named her yet?" Heero wondered.

"Tiger Lilly," Duo replied. He blinked, looked up with focus at last, and pocketed his notebook. He cracked knuckles and looked down at his hands. "Uh, Heero... I really wanna thank you for coming out to look in on me. I hate hospitals. Pretty stupid of me to take a dive and need one. I'm okay, though. You don't have to follow me around."

He was being dismissed. How long would it be until there was another reason to see Duo? Heero looked at Duo's thin face, his sheepish grin, and his eyes... his eyes were not matching his expression. They looked bottomless, lost, needy... They were asking him for something. Heero struggled. He needed a reason to stay.

A door opened behind them. Heero started and then noticed that there was a restaurant there. "Let me buy you lunch, Duo. We can talk... about your ship."

Duo looked stunned. "Ah.... okay... Sure thing, Heero."

Heero motioned Duo towards the restaurant. As Duo turned to enter, Heero found himself smiling and couldn't remember the last time that he had done that. 


	2. Distractions

Kracken

Disclaimer:I don't own them and I don't make any money off of this.  
Warning: Male/male sex, graphic, language, violence

Tiger Lilies

Distractions

"Five ham and cheese crepes, extra cream," Duo ordered after skimming the menu. "Two of those butter rolls with the garlic, and that..." He frowned as he looked closer at the menu.. "How do you say that?"

The male waiter bent to look. "Poulion," he said with an apologetic smile. "Don't worry about it. The owner made up the name. He thought it would sound French. The dish is just sauteed onions, chicken, and peppers."

"Great. I'll have that too... and some coffee, extra cream." Duo closed the menu as the waiter moved away and then froze when he saw Heero's wide eyes. "That was too much, wasn't it? Sorry... Maybe I should change the order?"

"No," Heero assured him quickly. "I told you 'whatever you wold like'."

"Then why the funny look?" Duo wanted to know distrustfully.

"I..." Heero wondered if calling attention to Duo's borderline malnutrition, would cause Duo to rethink eating. He decided to let the mystery slide and said instead, "You sounded as if you've eaten here before."

"Oh," Duo said sheepishly. "I don't get out much, actually. I just know what I like."

Heero was puzzled. "I didn't think that you liked crepes. During the war, I remember that you ate mostly canned nutristew and fried rice."

Duo glared through his bangs. "Hey, I'm not a kid anymore. I think I've expanded my eating horizons a little since then."

Heero looked down at his menu. He was sounding critical. He needed to loosen up and forget, like Duo's eating habits, the prickly relationship they had experienced during the war. The problem was, that he had spent the last few years dealing with programmer think tanks, not developing 'socializing with Duo Maxwell' skills. In fact, his social life had been restricted to a few office parties and two one night stands where he had managed to frighten one date and bore another. He shivered mentally. He would never listen to coworkers again tell him that they had found the perfect match for him. It had shown him, rather painfully, how much even his coworkers didn't know him.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to offend you," Heero apologized. When Duo looked mollified, Heero thought, Good, now say something to make up for that blunder. Unfortunately, nothing came to mind. They ended up staring at each other.

"Okay," Duo finally said, uncertainly. The waiter brought his coffee. He poured cream into it liberally, stirred, and then used both hands to raise it to his lips for small sips.

He needed to talk about something, Heero thought. Not eating... not the war... "You look... older." Heero winced inwardly.

Duo looked at him over the rim of his coffee cup. "Uh, yeah."

"But the same," Heero amended.

"Is that a crack about my height?" Duo growled.

"NO!" Heero exclaimed and then calmed himself as he tried to recover. "I... You're looking good. That's what I meant."

"Oh." Duo's anger deflated. He put his mug down, giving Heero an appraising look. "You've changed a lot. You lost that baby face." He looked embarrassed, turned pink, and amended, "That's not bad, though... uh..." He blushed some more. "You look good, too," he finished lamely.

Heero felt his stomach twist into a knot. "Thanks," he replied quietly.

Their meal came. The waiter arranged the plates in front of them while they sat silently. Heero had ordered a simple fish and rice dish. He was so nervous, he didn't think that he could eat a bite.

"Thank you," Duo told the waiter and the man smiled and winked at him. Duo was oblivious. He had already picked up a fork and was eating quickly. "I'm starved," he said around a mouthful.

Heero watched him. For all Duo claimed to be hungry, he didn't eat a great deal in the end. Heero suspected that his stomach hadn't held much in some time and it was rebelling after only a few large bites of crepe. Duo stirred his food around in frustration.

"Take it home with you," Heero suggested. "Perhaps you'll be hungry later."

Duo smiled, relieved. "Good idea." He nodded at Heero's food. "You need to eat, man."

Heero put his fork down. "I'm not as hungry as I thought."

"Then we both need doggie bags," Duo motioned to the waiter.

After their food was packed, they sat quietly over more coffee and Heero struggled. He needed to say something. The meal was over. The check would come. Duo would walk away. After an hour of sitting with the ex pilot of Deathscythe, Heero knew that his attraction to the man was as strong as ever. It was peace time. They were both alone. Even if he could only have Duo as a friend, he thought, it was better than seeing him walk out of his life once more.

Duo had taken a pencil from his hair. In the long silence, he must have grown bored, because he began to sketch ship diagrams intently on a napkin. It was an opening.

"Duo," Heero said a little too strongly. When Duo looked up, startled, he said, "Your ship, do you mind if I see it? I might... I know something about ships. I might be able to... help you." He almost didn't say that, not sure how Duo would interpret that. Would he think it was an insult, that Heero was accusing him of not being able to do the job himself?

"You have a job, Heero," Duo replied, but there was a definite reluctance to argue in his expression. "I can't ask you to-"

"I'm offering," Heero told him firmly. "I have a few weeks of paid vacation. Nothing much is going on at the moment. One phone call, a trip to my apartment for some of my gear, and I can go with you-" He stopped, mortified at himself. He hadn't just asked to see and, maybe, tinker a bit with Duo's ship, he had just now planned an entire vacation with the man!

Duo was wide eyed, mouth a little open. "I..." He rubbed at the back of his neck as he crammed the napkin into a pocket. "I don't get it," he admitted.

Heero knew what he meant. He had spent a war being a cold, efficient soldier. His 'friendship' with Duo had been exhillerating but it had been hard edged and almost combative at times. After the war, Heero had tried to forget all about Duo. He didn't blame Duo for questioning his sudden change of heart.

Heero decided on the truth. He met Duo's eyes squarely and said, "Sometimes, we don't see what's important, until it's gone."

Duo blinked, went pale, and then said softly, "I guess you can crash with me, but... don't expect anything fancy. I live out on the fringe."

"I know," Heero assured him. "I don't need much."

"I still don't really understand why you want to hang out with me," Duo told him as he slid out of his chair and stood up, "But I'm not complaining."

They took a cab to Heero's apartment and, on the way, Heero called his work place and informed him that he needed to take his vacation. They weren't pleased, but they knew how much Heero was worth to them, so they didn't argue very much.

"Like your job?" Duo wondered. He was slouched in his seat with their food containers in his lap. He was looking down at them, fiddling with the styrofoam.

"Yes. It's been a nice change from..." Heero struggled.

"From killing people... yeah, I know," Duo finished. "Sorry, dumb question."

"You?" Heero wondered and then clarified when Duo looked puzzled. "Do you like your job?"

A piece of styrofaom came off and Duo fiddled with it between his fingers. "I guess you're going to find out... I don't have a job-I mean... I did.. But... it didn't work out. I've been looking for another one... It's been hard."

"I understand," Heero told him, feeling the bitterness of his own search for a place in the world. "It's difficult to get a 'normal' job when Gundam Pilot, terrorist, and assassin, are on your resume. They wonder why you aren't in the military or the Preventers."

Duo grimaced, "Yeah, people like us aren't supposed to be bussing tables or doing someone's ether hookup."

Heero looked Duo over, saw the old clothing, the pinched face, and cautiously asked, "The government can help you with your bills. They helped me for awhile."

"'Awhile' being the key word," Duo sank lower into his seat and looked hard out of the window. "This is a bad idea, Heero. I want to hook up again and be buddies, but... I don't have a job. I don't have any money. My place is probably locked up because I didn't pay the rent. All I do is go from one lame job to the next and work on my ship. You don't wanna know me any more."

Heero felt his pain, but he wasn't going to let him go, not now. "Before I found my current job, I was homeless. I couldn't find anyone to hire me and I didn't want... didn't want to kill anymore, so most of the work I was capable of, I was unable to apply for. I wandered from place to place, ate at soup kitchens, and stayed in charity houses. I-I drank for awhile... Sally Po walked past me on a street corner and almost didn't realize it was me. She found me a job, had me go to training sessions to learn how to do a nine to five life."

"Like a fairy tale," Duo said bitterly.

"No," Heero admitted with a sheepish smile. "I screwed up three jobs before I managed to get this one right."

Duo looked at him then, wide eyed. "Yeah?"

Heero smiled back and nodded. "Yeah. Let's see..." He scrunched down into the seat to be on a level with Duo. "The first job, my boss told me, 'eliminate the competition, Yuy'"

Duo looked shocked. "You didn't-"

Heero shook his head. "No, he stopped me at 'I promised myself that I wouldn't kill anyone, sir.' I sufficiently scared him enough that he let me go. The second job... My boss walked up behind me and clapped me on the shoulder. He barely managed, 'Good job on that account, Yuy.' before I cold cocked him, sending him to the hospital. Fortunately, they didn't press charges."

Duo snorted. "I, uh, had the same thing happen in my last job, only the boss was telling me what a lame ass waiter I was."

Heero frowned sympathetically. "I can't imagine you as a waiter, Duo."

"I was down to the bottom of the barrel. I have a reputation around here now," Duo replied sullenly. He went back to fiddling with his piece of styrofoam for a moment and then he prompted. "And what happened with the third job?"

Heero was silent.

Duo looked at him. "That bad?"

Heero sighed and ran fingers through his messy chocolate hair. "I was head of security systems for Relena Peacecraft. She... wasn't aware that I was gay."

Duo went white, wide eyed, completely and utterly shocked. His mouth hung open. "Y-You're..."

"Gay," Heero repeated and felt as if he had just stripped naked. Duo didn't know? He supposed that he hadn't exactly advertised it... or practiced his orientation, he thought with a deep blush, but everyone else had figured it out without being told. It had never occurred to Heero that Duo wouldn't. "Does that bother you?" An entirely new anxiety formed. If Duo was disgusted by him...

Duo was having trouble recovering. He did a fish imitation and then said, "I... uh... hell no. I'm...uh... gay too."

Silence. They regarded each other, both of them wrapping their heads around this new insight into each other. "I thought you might be," Heero replied at last. "I wasn't absolutely sure, though. Hilde..."

Duo thought about that. "Yeah, I can see how you would think that, but... she's a good kid and all...naive... tough as nails... but, not anyone I'd want to... well, she's like a kid sister and all that."

"I see," Heero replied in relief.

"Relena didn't know either?" Duo asked with a small snicker.

Heero made a long suffering face. "No. I thought she was being friendly, wanting to help me, wanting... well, she finally declared herself and I... I'm not sure what I replied, but I couldn't leave fast enough. She wrote me a note of apology later, but we were both so embarrassed. I don't think I can face her again any time soon."

"This is your stop!" The cab driver rapped knuckles on the bullet proof glass separating them. To get their attention.

Heero paid the man through a slot and then he and Duo were both getting out in front of a towering building.

Duo looked up and up at the uniform stack of apartments. "Do you ever forget which one is yours?" he wondered jokingly.

"Sometimes," Heero chuckled. "Not today, though. Come on."

Heero paused at the doorway and turned to Duo. He searched for the right words, wanting to make sure that he didn't get it wrong. "It took me awhile to figure life out, Duo. It didn't come all at once and it wasn't easy. I just want you to know... I'm not going to judge you because you're still trying to find out what you want."

Duo frowned sharply. "I do know what I want Heero, it's just getting it I'm having trouble with. I want to pilot my own ship. My problem with my jobs, is that I only want them to pay for parts."

"Duo," Heero paused, feeling as if he might be stepping on a minefield. "Unless we are in the military or Preventers, we're prohibited from piloting. You must know that? It was in our articles of release from war crimes."

Duo's frown deepened as if he was having trouble hearing. "Yeah... I guess I do know... Can't shake the dream though... can't stop building my ship..." He seemed to get lost, distracted, his eyes on the distance, and then he was back and grinning at Heero. "Guess I'll be looking for yet another damned job, so don't worry.... well, unless we get to my place and I don't have my place anymore."

Heero recovered with difficulty. Duo knew, but he was purposefully ignoring the law. That troubled Heero. He wanted to get to know Duo again, more than anything else, but he had worked very hard to prove that he was a law abiding citizen. Freedoms came with being trusted. Duo had been working on his ship for a long time, though, and it seemed, from his description, that he was still far from finished. The chance of him actually trying to take that particular ship into orbit were, at least right then, nonexistent. Heero could put off worrying about it for now, until it until it became a reality.

Heero used his password on the keypad at the door and then motioned Duo inside. "Maybe I can help you look for work," he offered. "I have some contacts."

"Jeez, Heero!" Duo laughed, "Help me with my ship, help me find a job... You make one helluva house guest."

TBC 


	3. Journeys

Kracken

Disclaimer:I don't own them and I don't make any money off of this.  
Warning: Male/male sex, graphic, language, violence

Tiger Lilies

Journeys

"How do you get supplies this far out?" Heero wanted to know as they left the last station connected to the ground shuttle.

"I have a gravi sled," Duo told him, but then, shoving hands into his pockets as he began walking past the last of the artificial earth and onto bare metal, he admitted, "I don't go into town very much. I have things drop shipped to me."

Heero hitched his duffle more securely on one shoulder and tried to reconcile the image of the Duo he had known from the war, a gregarious 'people' person, with the reclusive ship builder he was following. Something had caused this change, he was sure. Something had sent Duo running and hiding.

It made Heero nervous to walk in the bare part of the station. He could see operating machinery along the walls and air filters and purifiers dotting the metallic landscape. It made their infinitesimal size that much more pronounced. They were ants in a metal tube in the vacuum of deep space.

Duo walked, head down, picking his way over the uneven slabs of riveted metal, and looking back at intervals to make certain that Heero was still following.

"If your landlord cancelled your lease for not paying rent, who else would he rent to?" Heero asked at last.

Duo grinned. "There are people who like to be alone, Heero."

"Are you one?" Heero wondered.

Duo ducked into his shoulders. "Uhm... I guess not, but they won't let me work on my ship anywhere else unless it's docked and I can't afford the docking fees."

"You've spent years out here then," Heero realized. "This ship must mean a great deal to you."

Duo frowned and he seemed at a loss. He scratched at his head and then shrugged. "I dunno."

Heero was confused. "I don't understand."

Duo made odd spinning motions with his hands as he said, "Means to an end, I guess."

Heero tried to apply that statement to a logical goal and came up short. "That doesn't make any sense," he replied carefully.

Duo was very quiet and then he sighed, "It sounded better than saying that I don't know."

Heero watched the slumped back ahead of him, the swinging braid almost hypnotic. "You want to pilot your own ship. You are building that ship. I understand that you've been making sacrifices to achieve that goal."

"And I don't know why," Duo told him. "I just have to. I guess that sounds... odd?"

"What prompted you to begin the project?" Heero hurried his steps so that he could walk beside Duo. Duo's eyes were narrowed in thought, his face set in a frown as if he were trying to remember a faint memory or a dream.

Duo shrugged. "I was at loose ends after the war. I had a lot of time on my hands. I thought I should do... something. I was planning to..." He trailed off and then shrugged again as he finished lamely, "And then I was scrounging ship parts and piecing them together to build Tiger Lily. I suddenly wanted to be a pilot."

Heero noticed the evasion. He had secrets in his life he would rather avoid as well. Even during the war, he had made wrong choices. He respected Duo's privacy on that matter. He supposed that some things didn't have apparent explanations. He hadn't chosen his current job and he supposed he would have had a hard time pinpointing any desire to do that type of work. Still, there was a large difference between working with computers and deciding to spend years building a ship for a position that was illegal.

"Well," Duo announced. "There she is, home sweet home."

Heero looked up and saw the rusted, tin building and the bare bones frame of a ship on supports. Surrounding it was a collection of scrap and garbage.

"I wasn't expecting company," Duo said sheepishly, darting a glance at Heero from beneath his bangs. "Not exactly a chalet in the Alps. Are you sure you want to stay?"

Heero met Duo's eyes as best he could, "I came to see you, not your home, Duo."

Duo was surprised into a shy smile."If I pinch myself any more, I'm going to have a bunch of bruises. This just doesn't seem like you at all, you know?"

"Is that good or bad?" Heero wondered, concerned that he was going too fast, inviting himself where he might not be welcome.

Duo grinned. "It's good. Great, as a matter of fact."

Heero smiled back. As they came closer to the structure, he recognized what it was. "This is a processor shed for shuttle fuel." His eyes wandered to metal tanks stacked nearby. They were rusted in their cradles. "Abandoned... Are they empty?"

Duo nodded and then looked thoughtful. "You know, I never really checked, I just assumed..."

Heero felt a chill of trepidation. He made a mental note to check them later.

The building was a rambling prefab and, once inside, it didn't look any better than the outside. The walls were lined with metal shelving and they were spilling forth every type of part, wire, and scrap of machine known to man. The floor was scuffed and bare metal. A few chairs, a couch losing it's shape, a vid screen crouching under several skewed slabs of metal, and a set of bunks that had probably not had their bedding changed since the previous owners of the building had lived there, were the only signs that someone lived in that mass of material.

Duo fiddled with his braid. "Bathroom's down the hall. Kitchen is through there. Pick your bunk, upper or lower?"

"Upper," Heero responded automatically as his eyes tried to take in everything.

"Guess I missed the housekeeping class," Duo said, trying for a joke.

Heero gave him the smile he was hoping for as he put down his duffel and took out his laptop. "Where can I hook up?"

"Third door down I have a computer parts room. I have my scanners and everything in there," Duo told him. "This may be the outer edge, but you can still plug into the ether easy."

They stood and stared at each other. Duo ducked his head. "Uh, make yourself at home... I have some tea around here. I'll put some on while you stow your gear and hook up."

"Thank you," Heero replied politely and Duo seemed eager to leave. Heero understood his reluctance to stay and explain such a high level of neglect, but Heero had suffered his own problems when he had first started living on his own. With no one to care, there hadn't seemed much point in worrying about appearances.

Heero tucked his laptop under his arm and found the computer room. He chewed on his lip at the stacks of motherboards, chips, micro processors, screens, and navigation parts. He found a table and cleared it off as best he could. Searching underneath, he found a hookup cord and attached his laptop power supply. The ether hookup was more elusive. Heero turned on his laptop and hoped for a clear signal. When he logged online without any problem, he was relieved. The ether was as much a part of him as his hands. He couldn't imagine going any length of time without it.

Turning and looking around him, he found Duo's scanners and his computer. The keys of the computer were filthy and it was tilted in such a way that Heero could imagine Duo sitting and balancing it on his knee as he worked. There was a sandwich on top of it, though, half eaten and looking old enough to have petrified. Duo hadn't used that computer in some time. Heero puzzled over that as he reached out and tapped a key. The screen sprang to life and an icon told Heero that he was logged onto the ether. The timer at the top of the screen told him that he had been logged on for almost two years.

Heero stared at the sandwich, stared at the screen, and then, glancing nervously at the door, he tapped two keys to bring up the last page viewed screen. A company web page popped up, the logo of the company spinning and flashing importantly. A login box contained two words, access denied.

"Tea's ready!" Duo called out. "I found two clean cups!"

Heero flinched and closed the screen. "Coming!" he called back, but his eyes lingered on the old sandwich as he memorized the company name before he went to join Duo.

When he was perched on the edge of an old chair and sipping his tea, Duo leaning against a table, piled with parts, and sipping his own, Heero decided to keep things neutral and not ask too many probing questions. Duo was more bold.

"Okay, so... out with it." Duo prompted.

Heero raised an eyebrow. "Good tea?"

Duo chuckled. "Liar. That tea is older than I am. I meant, your life was going good, you get a call from Wu Fei that I took a nose dive, and now you're here spending some time with me. I really don't know how you got from A to B."

Heero looked down into his tea, flushing. "I...." He tried again. "It took me awhile to find out who I was, what I wanted. I didn't have time to think about... friends."

"You sound like a soap opera; Heero Yuy goes to find himself." Duo cocked his head to one side and then he straightened and paced, avoiding the stacks of parts. "So seeing me again made you think about having friends? Why me? Why not Wu Fei? You saw him too and at least he had his act together."

"Do you want me to go?" Heero asked, not sure what Duo wanted from him. He thought he had explained himself well enough at the caf‚. Maybe it was harder for Duo to accept now that they were in his home, now that Duo realized that Heero would come all of that way to stay with him. Maybe he hadn't expected Heero to go that far.

Duo rolled his eyes and grinned. "Of course I don't want you to go!" Then he looked shy and fiddled with his tea cup. "I just like things spelled out. I'm not very good with reading between the lines. If you tell me exactly what this is, I'd appreciate it."

Heero swallowed hard, almost choking on his tea. He lowered his cup. Mission parameters. Duo was almost as bad as he was. Could he admit to feeling something? Duo wanted him to be truthful. He respected that. "Developing," he finally replied and ducked his head.

Duo was very quiet and then he said, "I just can't... square this with you. I still see the stone cold killer from the war, the man with ice for blood, the man who won a war. " He sighed. "When I was fifteen, I was an idiot about what I felt and what I wanted. I always wanted to be around you, though. Even after the war, I'd think about you sometimes, but maybe that's more than you're ready for. If you just want to be friends..."

"I'd like to be friends...." Heero stood and made a space for his tea cup on a table. He struggled to put his feelings into words. Duo was patient, keeping his attention on his tea. "I've spent a great deal of time finding out what I want. When I saw you, I suddenly saw what I needed."

Duo blinked. "Needed," he echoed and then he was putting aside his own cup and digging hands into his back pockets. He looked down at the dirty floor for a long minute and then he said, "I guess I've been needing too. Gets lonely way out here. Gives you a lot of time to think, a lot of time for regrets."

"I don't regret what we had to do," Heero told him seriously, "or the cost. But that's done now. We're free to live as we wish."

Duo paced again and it was awhile before he said, "Can we just be friends?" He looked at Heero anxiously and quickly added, when he saw Heero's disappointment, "I mean, until we figure each other out again? We have a lot of catching up to do." He laughed jokingly. "Maybe we'll find out we don't even like each other?"

Heero remained serious as he replied, "I don't think that's going to happen."

They finished their tea and Heero checked out his bunk. The blankets were as old and as musty as he had feared. "Duo," he began, but Duo looked embarrassed.

"Clothes cleaner in the back." Duo nodded down the hallway. "I don't use the bed... usually... okay, never."

Heero waited for an explanation, but Duo didn't seem ready to give one. He helped Heero strip the beds and carry the bedclothes to the machine perched precariously on a metal slab at the back of the building. Stuffing it full, Duo flipped on the sonic scrubbers and the machine began to emit a tortured wine.

"Everything's old and broken down out here," Duo sighed. "Never really had the cash to replace stuff."

"Your computer as well?" Heero wondered, seeing a perfect opening.

Duo frowned as he sat on top of the washer, legs dangling. "Computer? Nothing's wrong with my computer."

Puzzled, Heero replied, "I noticed that it hadn't been used for some time... that's why I assumed... "

Duo suddenly hopped off the washer, braid swinging. "I have to go work on Tiger Lily, if you don't mind. "

"No, I don't mind," Heero began, but Duo was already striding around the building to his ship. Heero stared after him, confused. He didn't feel as if he had made Duo angry. Duo had seemed... distracted... no... more like he was entirely focused on something other than Heero or their conversation.

Heero searched his memory of Duo, tried to fit this behavior with things he'd seen of the ex pilot of Deathscythe. None of them were normal, but Duo had seemed less effected by events than the rest of them. He'd never displayed compulsive behavior.

Heero considered going after him, considered taking that chance to look over Duo's ship himself, but he decided that it was too soon. Duo was right. They needed to go slow and discover each other again.

Heero washed and dried the bedclothes, made the beds, and then wandered Duo's home, marveling at the inventory of ships' parts that he had managed to collect. Many of them were in working order and Heero had to wonder, when he finally ended up back in the kitchen, why Duo had failed to make a ship from it all. There seemed enough to make several.

Deciding to make dinner for them, Heero discovered that Duo didn't own anything that wasn't freeze dried, canned, or of questionable nutritional value. The refrigerator was full of beer, something that had turned green and was unidentifiable, and an old bottle of champaign. Examining it, Heero recognized it from Quatre's party.

Heero decided on frieze dried beef and noodles. He managed a sauce out of beef cubes and the reconstituted beef luckily wasn't salted. Now that he had a valid excuse, Heero went out to where Duo's ship was dry docked. He found Duo crouched by a strut, trying to wire a panel.

The ship was even more bare bones that Heero had thought. It was a collection of struts with a few heat paneled sections towards the back. Wiring was hanging everywhere and Duo's collection of parts had followed him there. He had them stacked inside the frame. Two years and he hadn't even paneled the ship. Heero knew Duo's skill. It didn't seem possible.

"I made dinner," Heero called out. When Duo didn't look at him, all his attention on his wiring, Heero tried again. "Duo?"

Duo looked at him then, blinking myopically.

"Dinner? I made beef and noodles," Heero told him.

Duo looked down at his wiring and then at Heero. He acted as if he were coming out of a dream and not sure if he were really awake. Finally, he put the wiring and tools down and swung down from the ship.

"How did you manage to make anything out of that mess in the kitchen?" Duo wanted to know. "I usually just suck on a beer and eat pretzels."

"It shows," Heero replied reprovingly.

"Already with the complaints," Duo chuckled good naturedly. "Are you trying to be a friend or my nonexistent mother?"

"Friend," Heero replied with a smile.

"That's good," Duo laughed. "Being my mother would just be weird."

TBC 


	4. Tangles

Kracken

Disclaimer: I don't own them and I don't make any money off of this.  
Warning: Male/male sex, graphic, language, violence

Tangles

They stretched out on their bunks to sleep, the phosphorescent glow of a low light making all of Duo's junk seem close and comforting rather than disastrously messy.

Duo chuckled lightly. "This feels like Howard's ship, sleeping in a bunk in the hold and hoping our asses don't get blown out of the water by Oz. Remember? You were all 'Big bad pilot' and you wouldn't even smile at my jokes. Absolutely nuts, but you were a damned good mechanic. I never thought that you would get Wing off the ground, even with parts from my old Deathscythe. Hell, my parts hardly got my Gundam off the ground." There was a moment of silence and then Duo said thoughtfully, "I was too young to really know what I wanted, especially considering what was going on, but..."

Heero, lying on his back on the top bunk, smiled. "I know. You confused the hell out of me, but I felt it too, even then. I'm glad... glad we have a second chance. I didn't think I was going to survive the war. I didn't think that I would have a chance for more than just killing. I spent the last few years trying to believe that it was real, that I wasn't dreaming."

Heero had a sudden urge. He turned on his side and then, tentatively, he leaned to reach down to Duo. He knew that Duo could see his hand in the dim light. Without hesitation, Duo's hand met his and closed around it; callouses, scars, and strength.

"It's good to have you here." Duo admitted. "I've been lonely."

Heero thought about his life and then replied, "I was surrounded by people, but I was lonely too."

A long silence and then their hands parted. Heero turned onto his back again. It felt as if his chest had expanded to a painful degree. He clasped his hands there and knew that he was smiling like an idiot, like a fifteen year old that he had never been.

It was hard to sleep after that. Aside from emotional excitement, the station was never quiet. In a place that was only bare metal and no dampeners, everything echoed, pinged, grated, and whistled as air moved and machines stopped and started. When Heero finally did fall asleep, those noises kept him from hearing Duo leave his bunk.

When morning cycle began, Heero was up as soon as the light touched his face. He rolled, looked eagerly into the bottom bunk, and then frowned when he discovered that Duo was gone. The easiest explanation, was that Duo was an early riser, except for the fact that his blankets barely showed the indent of his body. If he had slept there, he hadn't slept under the blankets.

"Duo!" Heero called, warning the man that he was up and moving around. He didn't receive any reply.

Heero jumped down from his bunk and pulled on jeans and a white tshirt. He searched the house and didn't find Duo anywhere. Going outside, he checked the ship. That's where he found Duo, curled up asleep on the bare bones deck with tools and dismantled parts all around him.

Heero stared, trying to make sense out of what he was seeing. He was certain that the parts by Duo were the exact same ones that he had installed the day before. Why would Duo take them apart again? Heero tried to examine them without coming any closer. They didn't look defective. Could Duo have installed them wrong? Heero searched his memory, but he didn't recall noticing any mistakes.

"Duo?" Heero called cautiously.

Duo sighed in his sleep and curled tighter.

"Duo?" Heero called, louder.

Duo jerked and sat up before he was fully awake. He listed like a drunken man, hands splaying flat to steady himself. He blinked blearily at Heero. "Wha... Heero?" He smiled and rubbed at his forehead where the metal deck had made an impression. "Glad you weren't a dream." He frowned. "I'm starved. I think you spoiled my stomach last night."

Heero smiled back and offered, "I'll make breakfast, all right?"

Duo grinned as he rubbed at his eyes. He smeared grease across his face. "Going to practice your cooking mojo again on my pitiful supplies?"

"I'll try," Heero promised, "but I can't keep this up. We need to order more supplies. I'll help pay my share."

Duo looked uncomfortable, then began to explain, "Uh, Heero..."

"I'll take care of it," Heero cut him off, reassuring him. "You can pay me back later."

Duo sighed in embarrassment. "I will," he promised. "I have my name on the labor boards. Someone will call... eventually."

Heero decided to change that painful subject and motioned to the dismantled parts. "Trouble last night?"

Duo blinked at him in confusion. "Trouble?" He looked around him at the parts. "No, no trouble. I'll have this together by lunchtime."

"Why did you take them apart again?" Heero wondered, "If there wasn't any trouble?"

"Apart?" Duo looked at him with raised eyebrows. "What do you mean, Heero? I never put them together to begin with."

"Yes, you did. Yesterday," Heero reminded him.

Duo smiled and picked up two parts. He fit them together. "A lot of these parts look alike. It was probably something similar."

"No," Heero began to argue and then changed his mind. "Sorry, you're right, I'm sure." He nodded to the ship. "Tiger Lily is so custom fitted, there's probably a great deal that I don't recognize about her."

Duo began screwing the two parts together. "She's definitely going to be one of a kind... if I can get enough parts to put her together."

Heero was completely confused now. "But you do, Duo. You have enough for several ships."

Duo laughed. "I wish!" Then he gave Heero a serious look over his joined part. "Are you okay, Heero? Maybe you should take a longer rest?"

"I'm fine," Heero replied. Whether Duo Maxwell was, or not, was another question.

Heero knew that he was right on both counts. Duo had taken apart machinery he had installed the day before and he did have enough parts to build several ships. Why Duo didn't know these things was a disturbing mystery.

"I'll go make breakfast now," Heero told Duo, needing time to think before questioning Duo about it any further. "I'll call you when it's done."

Duo smiled at him warmly. "I could get to like this very easily."

Heero smiled back, "Good. I want you too."

Breakfast was pleasant. They talked, they laughed, and it felt good. Heero recalled how hard it had been to connect with anyone around him, even remotely. He couldn't get close to people who didn't understand him and could never understand him. With Duo, he didn't have to try. Duo knew he had been a killer, a weapon, an assassin, and a terrorist. Duo knew him almost to the bottom of his soul and he accepted it, because he was cut from almost the same cloth. There weren't any judgements. There weren't any nervous looks. There was only pleased smiles and a feeling that here was home; not back at his lonely apartment, but here where he could sit and talk to Duo and feel... normal.

Duo finished eating before Heero. He seemed to inhale his food, talking in between bites with amazing skill. It was obvious that he was enjoying the meal. Considering how Heero had scraped dubious items together to make it, that was a miracle in itself. The lull in their conversation, though, as Heero finished his meal, was enough to cause Duo to bring out his note pad and begin scribbling schematics and notations. He became perfectly absorbed in the task.

Heero watched him, turning the notations around, mentally, and studying them. They were the exact same schematics that he had seen Duo making earlier and Heero was certain that he wasn't changing any of it. A dark realization, that, if he looked, Heero would see those same notations copied through most of the used pages of the book, made his meal go cold in his stomach.

When Duo stood, still fully absorbed in his notes, and made his way back out to his ship without a word to Heero, Heero knew that he was going to work again. It would have been easier to think that he had offended Duo in some way, that Duo was angry and snubbing him, but Heero had seen his total fixation. It was as if he were in a trance.

Unless interrupted, Heero was certain that Duo would continue to work all day long. His neglect of his own person was becoming more and more understandable. Without Heero there to distract him, to make him meals, to remind him to sleep, if even a little, Heero didn't think that Duo would have done any of it. That begged the question; why? Heero was certain that his answer was on Duo's computer.

Without fear of being interrupted, Heero went into Duo's computer room and sat down. He gingerly knocked the old sandwich off of Duo's keyboard and brought the screen to life. The web page with it's access denied was his jumping off point. Heero had to backtrack from there and follow Duo's steps in the computer's memory. What he found there, easily enough, had him pulling out his cell phone and calling Quatre Winner.

Two secretaries later, the man himself answered the phone sounding busy, but ready to talk to his old war companion.

"Heero! A pleasure," Quatre greeted him. "Is it possible for us to speak at lunch? I'm about to go into a meeting..."

"No," Heero replied with a steely tone.

"Oh." There was a sound as if Quatre was changing the phone from one ear to another and sitting down, then his voice, concerned, asked, "Is anything wrong?"

"Tiger Lily," Heero said. "Tell me what it is."

"I don't know, Heero," Quatre replied and he sounded as if he were trying to calm an animal that might be dangerous. "You sound upset. I'm ready to help in any way that I can."

Heero organized his thoughts, weighed whether Quatre was telling the truth or not, and then decided that he didn't have any choice and that he had to confide in the man. "Duo accessed one of your companies restricted files two years ago. A program called Tiger Lily was downloaded to his computer. I opened it and the two words, Tiger Lily, flashed in a coded sequence on the computer screen before it shut itself down and returned to your companies web site."

Quatre's confusion was genuine. "Which company?" When Heero told him, Quatre gasped. "That's one of my principal banking institutions. Why was he..." Quatre fell silent, not ready to accuse his own friend.

"He was trying to steal your money, Quatre," Heero told him bluntly. "He had the accounts of several orphanages ready to receive funds and he was diverting a very small amount to his own account."

"Why would he do that?" Quatre wondered, perplexed. "He must have known that we would have been able to trace the transfers."

"No, you wouldn't haven't have," Heero told him. "He had a blind trust set up under an officer's name, for war widows. No one would have questioned it." Heero added ruefully, "He also had actual credits going to that fund with at least thirty five recipients, all legitimate war widows."

Quatre said faintly, "At least our thief has a good heart." He collected himself and asked, "but why would he suddenly decide to steal?"

"It wasn't for himself," Heero replied. "The amount he put into his own account was pocket change."

"Do you know what this program, Tiger Lily, is?" Quatre wondered, perhaps thinking that his systems might be infected by a virus. "Isn't that the name of Duo's ship?"

"Yes," Heero replied, "and I suspect that the program has a direct link to Duo's obsessive behavior concerning that ship."

"Obsessive?" Quatre sounded suddenly guilty. "I've been holding the title to Duo's home, " he admitted. "I bought it as soon as I knew that he was living there. I wanted to help all of you in any way that I could. He was paying the rent regularly, managing to keep odd jobs, but then he stopped working all together and the rent didn't come. I thought he needed time to find another job, so I didn't call, didn't question."

"He lost his jobs because he's been working on his ship," Heero explained and told Quatre about Duo's collapse and stay in the hospital. "Duo's obsession with Tiger Lily isn't normal, Quatre. I know that you have access to the classified files taken from the doctor's labs. If you can access Dr. G's work, perhaps we can find some mention of the program."

Heero could hear Quatre's doubt. "But how could a program of Dr. G's deploy from one of my companies?"

"Satellite relay," Heero replied confidently. "The program was downloaded to the core, waiting for Duo's signature codes, his ether footprints, to show up where they didn't belong. It's possible that Dr. G realized that Duo might use his training to break the law and this was his failsafe for keeping Duo under control."

"Hypnotic suggestion?"Quatre sounded angry. "We found where they had experimented on some operatives, and some troop divisions, using code words to deploy them on preset missions. They failed though. An operative, a soldier, without free will, is a bad weapon. They couldn't adapt to variables."

"That might be what is happening to Duo," Heero realized. "The program deploys, it seems, whenever he isn't actively engaged. Sleep is not actively engaged. Lack of conversation, a pause during a meal, or, perhaps, negative thoughts could also trigger it. I don't think Dr. G considered these variables when he programed Duo to stay occupied by building Tiger Lily."

Quatre was quiet and then he wondered, "Is it possible that the strength of the suggestion increases the more negatively Duo feels?"

"Possible, but uncertain," Heero replied.

"You said that he collapsed from self neglect before you arrived," Quatre reminded him. "Has that neglect continued?"

"In minimal ways," Heero replied thoughtfully. "He was unable to sleep unless he was working on Tiger Lily and he's gone to work on it now, triggered by a lull in our conversation during breakfast."

"That's a clue," Quatre decided. "Hypnotic suggestions usually have a trap door, a set of circumstances or code words that allow the subject to be released from the suggestion. I'll go through the files and see if I can discover what they might be. In the meantime, you might pursue the question of why Duo set this all into motion."

"Agreed." Heero realized that he sounded as if he were on a mission. He took a breath and tried to stop that force of habit. "Thank you," he told Quatre, surprising the man. "Duo is important to me. I think we can be close. I think that we can have a relationship together." It was hard to say those things, the soldier in him cringing, but he wanted to be honest with Quatre. He wanted the man to understand why he was helping Duo and that he would take care of him.

Quatre sounded as if he were smiling, "You two are so stubborn, so tough, or at least you were pretending to be. I had hoped, ever since the end of the war, that you would finally become friends. I'm happy that it's become more than that."

"Heero, it's raining! Can you believe it?" Duo exclaimed as he poked his head into the room. He was soaking wet. "I barely pulled the hanger over Tiger Lilly before it soaked all the controls!"

Duo saw the phone lifted to Heero's ear. He blinked.

"Who're you talking to?" Duo asked.

"I'll search the files, Heero," Quatre's voice said quickly, having heard Duo. "Take care of him."

The phone went dead and Heero lowered it into his lap. "Quatre," he replied truthfully, but his next word weren't, "Wu Fei spoke with him about your hospital stay. He wanted to know if you were all right."

"Quatre!" Duo grinned, but looked embarrassed too. "He's always the best, you know?"

"I know," Heero replied as he stood up. "You're dripping. I'll help you dry off."

Duo blushed and looked nervous. "I'm a big boy, Heero. I think I can..." He stopped talking, swallowed, and amended, "Okay." as Heero came and took him by a wet elbow.

It took a few moments to find towels. Pulling off Duo's sodden clothes took longer. Duo seemed to help and to hinder at the same time, clutching when Heero was pulling. Finally, he stood naked, staring at the floor. He was lean, broad in the shoulder, and smooth, almost hairless. His flat stomach ran in a long line down to a thatch of hair that was the same cinnamon color as the hair on his head. Below it, he was... perfect. Heero was swallowing now and blushing as he looked away and began drying Duo with the towels.

It happened all of a sudden. Heero wasn't certain who leaned in first or what prompted it. There wasn't any signal, any hint, and then they were kissing, long and deep. It was hot, passionate, wonderful. Bodies met, hands smoothed and caressed, and Heero's mind almost short circuited when he dropped the towels and cupped the bare cheeks of Duo's ass with his broad hands.

Duo moaned into his mouth and then his hands began pulling at Heero's clothes. Get them off! Was the silent command and Heero was only too happy to comply. Heero couldn't think, especially when Duo's hand closed around his erection and stroked it possessively as he led Heero by it towards the lower bunk. He didn't consider whether it was the right time, whether it was a good idea or not, or whether a Duo Maxwell under the influence of a hypnotic suggestion was free enough to give his consent. It seemed completely right, what they were doing, and the most natural thing in the world.

They tumbled onto the bed. Legs intertwined, crotches met and rubbed, tongues and lips continued to do battle. They explored, they tasted, and they both sizzled in the heat of their desire for each other. Hands finally stroked erections, falling into a mutual rhythm, rubbing hot, silky flesh against each other until they both exploded into orgasm.

They rested in each others arms afterward, holding each other tight. Hearts pounded as they realized what they had just done and what an enormous step they had just taken. Finally, Duo looked into Heero's eyes with a question. Heero knew what he was asking without words. What was this? A quick relief? A mistake? Something they would regret?

Heero smoothed a hand along Duo's cheek and then he said softly, "Love you."

Duo smiled and held him tight, burrowing his face into the curve of Heero's neck and shoulder. There was a relieved sigh and then he whispered the words, "Love you, too."

Mysteries could wait a few hours, even another day, Heero thought as he savored the feel of Duo in his arms. This was the sweetest moment of his life. It was as if he had been walking in darkness and then Duo had lit a candle, one that he had been holding for as long as they had known each other. Waiting for Heero to need it, waiting for Heero to ask for it, and waiting for Heero to give him the match. Now that it was lit, Heero intended for it to never go out.

TBC 


	5. Peeling Onions

Kracken

Disclaimer:I don't own them and I don't make any money off of this.  
Warning:Male/male sex, graphic, language, violence.

Tiger Lilies

Peeling Onions

Duo was there when Heero woke up, but he was soon going back to his ship when Heero turned to do the dishes and call for supplies. Heero felt worried, but he was riding high on a wave of joy, remembering the sleepy purple eyes that had opened that 'morning' and the lips that had smiled at him, telling him that Duo wasn't regretting ending up in bed with him.

They had been shy, quiet, ready to explore this new part of their lives, but uncertain, inexperienced, and not used to seeing each other in a romantic light. Heero smirked, realizing that they had jumped from friend, to lover, to wanting a relationship in record time, but he didn't think that was a bad thing. They had spent far too long being alone. If something was wrong with Duo, then he needed Heero, needed the comfort and help that Heero was sure that he could give him. United at last, they would beat whatever this problem was.

After Heero finished ordering supplies, he went into the computer room and brought up the Tiger Lily program. He studied the code, the flashes, and the word. Why Tiger Lily? Did it mean something to Duo, or to Dr. G? Did the code to neutralize the compulsion lie in the choosing of that name? Heero had confidence in Quatre's ability to find everything possible in Dr. G's research, but, in the end, the old saying, 'dead men tell no tales.', might be a painful truth if that research didn't give them their answers.

Dr. G had not been a stupid man, but he had been as cold blooded as the rest of the doctors when it had come to using them for their purposes. The greater number deserved the sacrifice of the few. All of the Gundam pilots had paid a great deal to carry out that philosophy. If Dr. G had been afraid of Duo using his training against peace and against the law, if he had decided to trap Duo in the compulsion to 'manage' him, then he might not have programmed a way out of that compulsion. Rehabilitation of Shinigami might not have seemed a possibility.

The vid phone rang. Heero answered it, feeling a little self conscious answering Duo's phone, until he saw that the number was secure and belonged to Quatre. "Find something?" Heero wondered, not even giving the man a chance to say hello.

Quatre grimaced, but was understanding as he replied, "Dr. G liked to record everything in his lab. We indexed everything that was tagged with Duo's name." Quatre frowned. "That man... I'm not sure that Dr. G was completely sane. He often used untested enhancements on Duo during his training, some of them with questionable results. It's all in the vid tapes I'm downloading to you. Pay particular attention to he file, 01- Tiger. That's the one that I think shows Duo being given his mental compulsion."

"You think?" Heero echoed with a frown.

Quatre began to reply and then said cautiously, "You will be able to see for yourself. The man did seem to genuinely care for Duo, but..." He stopped, licked nervous lips, and then decided against finishing that thought. "Contact me with a progress report as soon as possible," he said instead. "I'll continue to search through the files in the mean time."

"Thank you," Heero told him and was surprised at the feeling in his voice.

"You're both my friends," Quatre told him warmly. "I know that we drifted apart, but I've never stopped feeling that way."

Heero put a hand on the screen and splayed his fingers there. "I felt the same way, I just..."He ducked his head, "I didn't think that any of could possibly want to be around me. I was so focused during the war, so... full of myself."

"We all were," Quatre replied. "We understand, Heero. We're all finding our places in this world right now, but we mustn't forget how important we were, and still are, to each other. Duo needs us. I know I'm not the only one ready to help the both of you."

"Thank you," Heero repeated, all that he could find to say, but it was enough. Those two words carried a great deal more meaning and Quatre understood that. His smile grew even warmer and then he was gone and Hero was left with several dozen files waiting to upload to his computer.

Quatre was right. After watching several, Heero had to conclude that Dr. G had not been operating logically at the best of times.

"Hey!" What was that for?" a smaller, much younger, Duo danced away from the Dr. rubbing his arm. The doctor glared as he lowered a hypodermic needle.

"C-4616," Dr. G replied.

"What's it do?" Duo demanded.

Dr. G shrugged. "It has an Oz coded label and it says muscle enhancer. My sweepers picked it off of a damaged research ship."

"What?" Duo was outraged. "What if it kills me?"

Dr, G sighed. "Then I'll have to go to a great deal of trouble to find your replacement. I'd feel bad about that so... don't die, all right, boy?"

Duo scowled. "Yeah, sure, just for you, old man," he retorted sarcastically.

Dr. G positioned the camera lens better and then motioned Duo to a padded chair. "Have a seat. It should take effect in twenty minutes."

The rest of the vid reel was Duo sitting, looking pale and anxious, while a clock ticked off the minutes. When nothing happened, he stood up, gave G the finger, and stomped out of view.

G glared after him, snorted, and then tossed the hypodermic into a fresh box of them.

The vid ended. Heero took a deep breath, remembering the cold, calculating Dr. J and his own training. He doubted that Dr. J had been very sane either, but the man had been a genius and very strict about procedure.

The rest of the vids were in the same vein. A few were of Duo coming into the lab during a recording and making a nuisance of himself until he was ordered to leave. In those few clips, Heero could see a loneliness and impatience in Duo that had mirrored his own feelings back then.

Heero saved the tiger vid for last since it's date was last in the sequence. When it played, he was left feeling disappointed and confused.

"What's that thing?" Duo leaned over a plant with several odd looking flowers.

"Tiger Lily," Dr. G grunted as he worked on something.

"Weird," Duo said and gave a flower a poke with one finger. "Doesn't look real. Is it expensive?"

"Why?" Dr. G wondered sourly.

"Looks expensive," Duo replied.

"Guess it would to an orphan of L2," Dr. G commented.

Duo scowled. "Yeah, guess everything does to someone like me.

"Duo?" Dr. G turned to him, took the flower, and put it into Duo's hand. Duo took it, puzzled. "You had a hard life and L2 was full of crime. You could so easily go back to it. That's dangerous as well trained as you are. I want to promise you that you'll never do that, you'll never go back to stealing and running with gangs."

Duo looked as if he were being handed a fairy tale story. He grinned and replied sarcastically, "Sure, old man, whatever you say."

"Yes," Dr. G said as he picked up a light from his table and turned it on. "Whatever I say." He reached for the camera and turned it off.

Heero stared at the blank screen as the vid stopped playing. He played it again. And yet again. Why would G turn off the video if he didn't have any qualms about recording other things? Had it been a conscious effort on his part not to record his methods?

Why? There were too many whys, Heero realized and he ached for Duo. He needed to watch the vids again. There had to be some clue that he was missing, some slip, some connection between something he was seeing and the vid of Duo being given his mental compulsion. He couldn't believe that Dr. G would launch into something that important without preparation... or without recording it. Heero began playing the vids one more time, frame by frame.

The sound of rain made Heero start, but he didn't stop his intense study of the vids. After the fourth hour, he sat back, rubbed his eyes, and sighed in exhaustion. There was only one pattern that he could discern. Every time that G injected Duo with one of his experimental drugs, he made Duo sit quietly until their effects became known. The only surprise there was that none of them seemed to have any effect on Duo whatsoever, except to increase either his irritation with the old scientist or his boredom. Each time, G didn't make any comment about this. He simply told Duo to go.

It hit Heero very suddenly. Dr. G was a mad scientist, but he was a scientist. The other vids showed him following a very tried and true process of experimentation and the meticulous recording of the results. It didn't make sense that he would stop that behavior each time that he was experimenting with Duo as his test subject. That being true, Heero could only conclude that G wasn't experimenting at all. He was recording, instead, a process.

Heero watched the vids again and turned off the sound. He watched G and Duo move, watched Duo sit down, watch Duo sigh and fidget, and saw... Duo stop fidgeting, stop moving, stop complaining for exactly one minute. Duo stared at G steadily, the man standing outside of the vid's frame.

It was something. Heero just wasn't certain what that 'something' was. He enhanced the picture, enlarged Duo's face, and began to run the vid again A crack of thunder interrupted him. He jumped out of his chair, hand reaching for a gun he didn't have. His heart was racing as he tried to understand why there was thunder in a space station. Dangerous was a word that hardly covered the catastrophic damage such an occurrence could create.

"Duo!" Heero ran for the back door and Guilt twisted his gut. How long had he listened to the rain, not realizing that Duo might be out in it?

Lightning flashes filled the 'sky' of the station. Something was out of balance, some finely tuned weather machine not doing it's job. He could see ships arrowing for the weather arrays, racing to shut the processors down manually. Charged and overloaded circuits shot sparks like fireworks and Heero could see some fire plumes towards the city that attested to some direct lightning hits.

Duo was crouched in the light rain, hands buried in a casing, hair plastered to his forehead and braid lying in water in a bedraggled rope beside him. His eyes were intense and his jaw was set hard.

"Duo!" Heero shouted as he threw himself up the metal scaffolding to reach Duo's side. Duo didn't look at him. The compulsion was stronger this time, combining with his natural stubbornness to finish a job.

Heero clutched at Duo's wet sleeve and shook at him roughly. Lightning struck a low building in the distance. The loud crack of thunder, and Heero's grip, made Duo start. He turned from his work at last and stared at Heero in a daze.

"Heero?" Duo looked up at the violent sky and then he was scrambling up and dragging Heero down the scaffolding and into the building as he shouted, "What the fuck were you doing out in something like that!" He threw a lever on one wall and air seals thudded into place around every window and door. Emergency air began pumping. Duo checked a gage to make sure the rate and mix were correct and then raked his wet bangs out of his eyes. "Heero?" he demanded again, furious. "You scared the shit out of me!"

Heero was panting from reaction, his shirt still twisted in one of Duo's fists. "Duo," he managed, trying to stay calm. "You were the one who was out there."

Duo released him and turned to check the satellite reports. Several very long moments passed and then Duo was sighing in relief. "They have it locked down and under control. The storm should end shortly."

Duo turned back to Heero, frowning, picking up the conversation where they'd left off. "I was out there?" he questioned incredulously.

Heero nodded and then lowered himself into a chair. He shivered at the chill of the pumped air on his wet skin. "Duo, we need to talk. I didn't want to say anything until I was sure, but... Do you recall the experiments that Dr. G performed on you during your training?"

Duo was looking confused, almost as if he were questioning Heero's sanity. He moved to a closet, yanked out several towels, and tossed one to Heero, who scrubbed at his face thankfully. "He told me they would make me a better pilot," Duo replied at last. "It was stupid. They never did anything. Crazy old man couldn't stop trying though."

Heero watched Duo dry off as he tried to explain, "Quatre and I-"

"Quatre?" Duo started. "What's Quatre..."

Heero held up a hand. "I'll explain." Duo sat down near Heero and Heero leaned forward, trying to gauge Duo's reaction as he continued, "When we met, you were in the hospital for neglecting yourself. After observing you... it seemed to me that you weren't acting in a rational manner." Duo scowled and looked ready to get angry about that, but Heero didn't give him the chance. "You are obsessed by Tiger Lily. Every time that you have nothing to do, you begin to design and build the ship. You appear to be in a trance state, as if you can't help yourself. The first day that I came here, I discovered that you had logged on to a corporate web site belonging to Quatre Winner. A program was deployed while you were hacking into financial files. I believe that this program was designed by Dr. G to stop you from using your training to commit crimes and that it was triggered by your ether signature. Quatre and I have looked at vid files made by Dr. G. We're trying to discover how he implemented the compulsion and what the keywords are to deactivate it."

Duo stared at him. He blinked very slowly. "I don't get something," Duo asked. "What were you doing out in that kind of danger, out in a charge storm on the metal decking of Tiger Lily? That's not the Heero Yuy I know. He has more sense."

Heero's mind shifted gears laboriously while he realized that Duo hadn't heard anything that he had said, or, he had heard, Heero decided, but the compulsion was keeping him from registering it. It obviously had a means of protecting itself, of keeping Duo from realizing that he was under mental suggestion.

Duo stood and moved to stand over him. His purple eyes gleamed as he shook his head. "Heero... if you want to help me with Tiger Lily that badly, then work with me so we can make sure we both don't over do it, okay?"

Heero found himself saying, "All right, Duo."

Duo smiled then and reached out to touch his wet hair. He took hold of a strand and gave it a small tug. "Come on, lets get changed and have some coffee."

Duo moved to get a dry shirt as he pulled off his wet one. Heero swallowed at the display of Duo's slim waist and strong shoulders. He almost followed Duo, almost decided to take their love making a step further, but... instead, he let Duo go, let him make coffee, and tried to decide what to do next.

Lightning flashes came through the thick, protective glass of a window close by. Heero stared at them, thinking about what could have happened, remembering holed space stations and failed air supplies during the war. He almost turned away, almost drowned in the memories of floating corpses, but then the flicker of lights triggered another type of memory all together; Dr. J lecturing him on psychological conditioning and forms of torture, preparing his ultimate soldier for every eventuality.

"I'll be just a moment, Duo," Heero called as he raced for his computer, sat down, and began playing the vids again. Once again in the vids, Duo sat down, irritated and complaining, while Dr. G stayed out of camera shot. Duo froze, staring.

"There!" Heero touched the screen with one finger and enlarged Duo's face. Very imperceptibly, the irises of Duo's eyes picked up tiny flashes of light. These were not vids of experiments on Duo Maxwell, Heero concluded excitedly . These were vids of Dr. G preparing Duo's mind to receive his mental compulsion.

TBC

see Kracken's original, published yaoi fiction, The Angel Within, at under Kracken Website:http:kracken. Latest updates at: http:groups. for general fanfiction talk: http:groups. 


	6. Out of the Dream

Kracken

Disclaimer:I don't own them and I don't make any money off of this.  
Warning:Male/male sex, graphic, language, violence.

Tiger Lilies

Out of the Dream

"Heero?" Duo lay side by side with Heero on the lower bunk. "Afternoon naps are nice, but I have a lot of work to do. Those supplies should be coming in soon too, so if you... you know... had anything else in mind..." He blushed and fell silent.

Heero looked deeply into Duo's eyes and then kissed him lightly on the lips. "Duo, I want you to trust me."

Duo blinked. "I do, Heero. Why do you think that I don't?"

Heero smiled nervously, trying to reassure him as he replied, "Because, what I'm about to do may seem... strange."

"Strange?" Duo almost frowned, but then he gave Heero's body a very quick flick of his eyes and his expression went tense instead. "Uh, Heero... if you're going to tell me that you want to... do... something... different... Uh..."

Heero snorted in irritation. "Duo, it's nothing like that."

"Oh." Duo's blush deepened and then he bulled forward, "Then tell me and get it over with."

Heero pulled out a pen light. "I need to shine this in your eyes."

Duo did frown then. "A light? In my eyes? Why?"

"It won't hurt you," Heero assured him.

Duo reached out and pulled a wild lock of Heero's hair. "I know that! But, why?"

"If it works, I'll explain then," Heero replied.

"Not before?"

"No."

"Heero..." Duo sighed. "Okay, it's just a light. Knock yourself out, then I have to get back to work"

"Thank you." Heero stroked a hand along Duo's arm and then supported himself on one elbow as he aimed his light."Don't blink," he warned.

Duo snorted. "You sound just like Dr. G..." He stopped speaking and looked as if he had tasted something bad. "Let's not go there. He's not someone I really want to think about."

"Relax," Heero told him and began to flicker his penlight, following the pattern he had seen Dr. G use.

Duo went very still, staring.

"You don't want to build Tiger Lily unless that's what you want to do," Heero told him. "You can do anything that you like, anytime that you wish. You don't have to plan to build Tiger Lily unless that's what you want to do. You can go anywhere and do anything that you wish to do."

Heero turned off his light.

"Duo?"

Duo blinked, frowned, and then suddenly latched lips onto Heero's. One of his hands slipped straight into the waistband of Heero's pants and grabbed him firmly. "Undress," Duo told him. "I want you, now. I want to see you naked and on top of me. I want to make love to you until we both can't stand up."

Heero struggled under Duo's assault. "Duo!" he protested.

"Hmm?" Duo hummed as he began unfastening Heero's pants.

Heero caught his hands. Duo bumped his erection against Heero's pelvis and then ground it wildly. Heero scrambled up and off the bed. Duo followed, stripping out of his clothes as he moved.

"What's wrong, Heero?" Duo demanded impatiently. "Don't you want me to-" his offer was both crude, graphic, and gave Heero an immediate erection. "I want to," Duo insisted. "I want you."

"I've made a mistake," Heero breathed, understanding suddenly. He had just told Duo to do anything that he wished. It seemed that Duo wanted sex. He had replaced one compulsion with another.

Duo tackled him. They both hit the floor hard, Duo half naked and Heero's pants in danger of being taken off by Duo's eager hands. Heero was confident that he was stronger than Duo, but he had to wonder, if he hadn't been, whether this would have been a rape. Duo didn't seem able to hear him, completely willing to fulfill his own desire despite what Heero wanted.

Heero grabbed Duo, rolled, and pinned him down to the floor. With one arm against Duo's throat, Duo struggling to get free, he used his free hand to take out the penlight again and flash it into Duo's eyes. He thought frantically, trying to think of the right thing to say.

Duo relaxed, staring. Heero took a steadying breath, and then said, "Duo, delete Tiger Lily programming. Duo, delete all recent suggestions."

Heero turned off the penlight and waited.

Duo blinked. Blinked again. He said at last, hoarsely, "What the hell is going on?"

Heero sat up and let Duo go. Duo scrambled away and grabbed a pipe from a pile of them near one wall. He hefted it as he struggled to his feet, half naked and vulnerable looking. There was pain and betrayal in his expression.

"Duo, please let me explain," Heero begged.

"Explain on the dam vid phone after you get the hell out of here!" Duo snarled. "What did I do to make you want to force me like that?"

"I didn't-" Heero began, but then he stopped. He had awakened Duo from a long sleep only it now looked as if Duo's 'Prince Charming' had been about to rape him. Any explanation about mental compulsions by a long dead Dr. G was going to sound pathetic.

"I invited you here because I thought we could have something together," Duo shouted at him. "I guess you were just looking for a quick screw and you got pissed when I didn't put out quick enough!"

"That's not true! " Heero shouted back. "I... I love you, Duo."

"You gotta weird way of showing it, freak. " Duo threatened with the pipe again. "I told you to get the hell out!"

Heero took only long enough to grab his laptop. He left everything else behind as he quickly headed for the door. A few steps outside, he turned to face Duo standing warily well away from him. "You'll see," Heero told him. "Look at everything that you've been doing for the past years, Duo. When you've calmed down, and you want your questions answered, you know my number."

"There isn't any explanation for what you tried to do. Get out!" Duo shouted and he slammed the metal door closed behind Heero with a clang and the grate of a metal lock sliding into place.

Heero returned home, feeling hollow, wondering if he had just experienced the end of his future. Without Duo, he could only see a long march of years alone. He knew that he couldn't replace Duo with someone else. Duo was in his soul, was a part of it, had intertwined himself into the core of his being. Even if Duo never realized what had happened, and never forgave him, it wouldn't matter. Heero had found his place and it was at Duo's side.

He waited by the phone. Refusing to do anything that might make him miss Duo's call... if he called. Two days crawled by while he didn't bathe, didn't eat, and ignored everything around him. He memorized every scratch and blemish on the vid phone's surface before it finally rang.

Heero stared in disbelief for three rings, before he decided that he wasn't hallucinating. He hit the reply button and almost fell out of his chair and onto the floor in relief when Duo's frowning face appeared.

Duo said slowly, "Heero... I need to know... I tried talking to Quatre... He called after you left. I... He said some things and I... saw some things... I'm kind of... confused." He grimaced as if he had made a mistake, as if that word hardly touched on the surface of what he felt.

It was all Heero could do, not to blurt out the entire story at once. That wouldn't help Duo. It wouldn't calm his obvious fear.

"Did Quatre say anything to you?" Heero asked first.

Duo's jaw worked and then he ground out, "After I got through yelling about you, yeah. He said that I had to talk to you, that I knew better what kind of man you were... I... I thought I knew you. Now... I feel like I'm wrong, somehow, but I don't know how I can be."

"Duo, do you remember hacking into one of Quatre's companies and funneling credits?" Heero asked.

Duo's face went white. He said in a small, tight voice, "Is that why? You found out about that and you thought... " His eyes were full of pain and some shame. "Guess if you act like street trash, someone's going treat you like it."

"Duo," Heero continued, refusing to be distracted, refusing to defend himself. "Do you remember Dr. G promising you that you would never have to steal again?"

Duo frowned, even more confused now. "Uh... y...yeah. Long time ago. How...?"

"Dr. G recorded everything that he did, including the sessions where you were injected with experimental drugs," Heero told him.

"What's this have to do with what happened with us!" Duo finally demanded, eyes glaring into the vidscreen now.

"Everything," Heero replied. "He wasn't experimenting, Duo, he was giving you a mental compulsion. He uploaded a program into the ether that would deploy if you ever hacked into important systems. You tripped it while you were funneling credits from Quatre's company."

"Compulsion?" Duo leaned into the monitor. He didn't doubt the possibility, or doubt that G had been capable of it. "That bastard! If he was alive, I'd kill him again! Is that why I'm living in this ships' parts graveyard? Is that why I have a freakin ships' hull outside my door? Is that why I have design notes all over the walls like some lunatic? That... freakin'... sonofa... motherfu... " He went suddenly silent, hand fisted at his mouth and body held in a tight clench. Finally, he took a shuddering breath and asked in a small voice, "How long?"

When Heero told him he closed his eyes in pain.

"I tried to help you," Heero told him. "Quatre helped me find the recordings that Dr. G made. I found how he had given you the compulsion. I... I tried to remove it through the same method. I told you... That you could do what you wanted to do."

Duo's eyes flew open and his face turned red. He lowered his hand and said breathlessly, "I did something... didn't I? Something that I wanted to do."

Heero nodded. "I made a mistake. I should have just deleted programming. Instead, I implemented my own. You...made advances towards me... sexually."

"And when I 'woke up' you were trying to stop me," Duo breathed. "Heero..." Duo was suddenly cutting the connection and turning away, unable to continue.

Heero stared at the blank screen. He had seen utter despair on Duo's face before the connection ended. He tried to call Duo back and wasn't surprised when he didn't answer. The fear that Duo might do something terrible in his despair, had Heero flinging himself toward his front door and flipping open his cell phone to call a cab. He closed his phone in the next instant, when he passed a window and saw workers fixing ether feeds that had been damage in the storm. Balanced on platforms along the outside wall, they had a small, hover cart to take them up and down the building for supplies.

Heero opened the window's seal and it hissed open into a service position. Heero squeezed out as an alarm sounded, letting people know of the unauthorized breech. He jumped the space between the window and the service cart, a five foot span ten stories up. He landed hard. The cart rocked and almost threw him out, but he held on and was in the driver's seat with the same smooth execution he had prided himself on during the war. Dropping the ships security tether, he ignored the shouts of the workers as he revved the engine and raced the vehicle towards the far rim of the station... and Duo.

He reached Duo's home in record time, but Heero's fear made it seem as if it had taken an eternity. Landing the cart in a skid of metal, barely missing a vent housing, Heero leapt down and ran into the building. He frantically searched every room, adrenalin making his heart race, but Duo wasn't there. Hitting the back door with the heel of his hand, Heero sent it spinning off it's hinges with a loud report of metal separating from screws. He ran to the skeleton of the ship and took the steps up to the half finished deck Twisting around and around, Heero looked for some sign of Duo.

"Heero!" The voice came from high above Heero. He craned his neck and blinked against the bright over head lights of the station. Seated on a scaffolding, at the very top arch of a hull strut, was Duo. In a dirty t-shirt and a ragged pair of jeans, he was slumped, braid trailing off the platform and into space, where it was swinging slightly. If he jumped... Heero calculated height, gravity, and the hard deck in the space between one breath and the next. From that height, Duo would die.

Heero cautiously climbed the scaffolding. The breeze from the ventilation stirred his hair and plucked at his clothing. He watched Duo carefully as he approached, not wanting to startle Duo into doing something rash. Duo was grimacing and looking embarrassed, one hand rubbing up and down his arm. He didn't look suicidal, Heero concluded, but he didn't let his guard down as he reached the platform and inched on to it.

"Duo," Heero said softly as he settled on his knees. "Please... let's talk about this."

Duo shyly nodded, but then he gathered his knees in his arms and pulled them against his chest. A defensive gesture.

"May I... come closer?" Heero asked. When Duo nodded again, he crept forward until only a foot separated them. He settled again. "When you hung up the vid phone... I was afraid," Heero admitted.

Duo lifted a thumb and chewed on the nail. "Is that why you were riding a service cart? Someone's gonna be mad about that."

"Doesn't matter," Heero told him. "I would have stolen anything to reach you."

Duo looked him in the eyes then, curious and intense. "Heero... I don't know what to say... how to..." He laughed, but it was dark. "That's why I hung up, fresh out of words to explain this level of screwdupness. I climbed up here to get some air and to get a handle on..." He motioned at all the parts and the ship, "... all of this. I can believe that rat bastard G could do this, but... years? I could have been doing a lot of other things besides... this."

"Duo," Heero asked, "Why did you steal money from Quatre? That set all of this in motion."

Duo sighed and ran fingers through his bangs. "I guess I was bored. I tried a few things... Didn't work out. I had this crazy idea that I needed to make some sort of difference, but, it's kind of hard when you're flat broke. I thought Quatre could spare it, right?"

"Duo, that money belongs to many people, not just to Quatre," Heero explained.

Duo thought that over. "I guess I should have just tapped into Quatre's personal accounts then."

"Duo!" Heero growled, but Duo was smiling, even though it was hard edged.

"I know, Heero, I'm not stupid," Duo assured him. "I made sure I skimmed off funds that were earmarked for someone who'd never miss it."

Heero frowned. "Duo, it's still stealing, and I think Dr.G was afraid of this very thing."

"So he made sure I served time," Duo replied angrily, "because he knew nobody would catch me."

"He made sure civilians were protected,"Heero countered. "I don't agree with how he accomplished that, but I understand his reasoning."

Duo scowled and pulled his knees in tighter.

"If you had asked Quatre," Heero pointed out. "He would have given you the money."

"Why?" Duo replied sullenly, "I'm just a sweeper brat who used to live on the streets. All I know is stealing and taking what other people leave behind. Taking Quatre's money... I just did what came natural." He hid his face against his knees. "Maybe," his muffled voice came, "you shouldn't have bothered waking me up. Maybe we could have stayed together... Heero Yuy and Duo Maxwell, eccentric nutcase. Sounds better than Heero Yuy and Duo Maxwell, thief."

Heero moved closer until he was up against Duo's side. Shyly, he put an arm over Duo's shoulders. "Heero Yuy and Duo Maxwell. You can leave off everything else."

Duo looked up in shock, eyes wide and uncertain.

Heero pressed his forehead against Duo's and said softly, "You're not stupid. I don't think you'll hack into any more accounts, am I right?"

Duo thought about it, considered, and then replied with what Heero knew was the truth, "No... I think I learned something... and... I think I have a good reason now not to get into any more trouble."

Heero lifted a hand and pushed some of Duo's bangs from his eyes.

"I'm still upset," Duo told him. "I don't know how to handle losing years from my life... like this... underhanded... like I've been used real dirty."

"You should be upset," Heero assured him. "I don't judge you for that. I want to help you. We'll talk about it and get through this together."

Duo reached up and touched Heero's face, a caress of calloused fingers. "I wish I'd known that you were like this during the war."

"Couldn't," Heero replied as he turned and kissed those rough fingers. "It was a secret. We had to win a war and grow up."

"Sorry I took longer to do the growing up part," Duo apologized as he watched Heero's lips nip and kiss as if in a daze.

"I just finished growing up too," Heero replied. "They say you aren't really an adult until you decide what you want and get it."

"And... what did you get?" Duo wondered.

"You," Heero replied. He leaned and captured Duo's lips with his own. They were soft and pliant and tasted salty from Duo's tears.

They were clutching at each other then, mouths opening as they devoured each other hungrily. Duo waited until Heero reached out, until Heero began pulling at his clothes, and then he was joining in, pulling at Heero's clothes as well

It didn't matter where they were. It didn't matter that they were suspended high above the ground, on a windswept platform, with a space station city stretched out below. They both needed, they both loved, and they both couldn't wait any longer.

Naked, they pressed together, hands smoothing and caressing, lips nipping and kissing, and straining erections meeting and doing battle between them as they moaned and rocked. Heero pushed up on elbows, moved Duo's knees apart, and lowered his mouth to take Duo in. He suckled and stroked with his tongue, tasting Duo, feeling him tremble, and hearing his gasps and moans of pleasure. Duo came explosively, hands clutching at Heero's hair, body arching up and around Heero, as if sheltering him as Heero finished Duo with a last, long stroke of his lips. Salty, warm; Heero let Duo's essence go and brought it to Duo's entrance.

Nervous and unsure; the world had disappeared for them. They were completely centered on each other, both inexperienced, but with some knowledge of what they wanted and how to go about getting it.

"Duo," Heero breathed.

Duo clenched his legs, hands on Heero tightening, but then he was sinking back with a look of acceptance and determination on his face as he relaxed and let Heero prepare him.

"Love you," Heero whispered and his voice trembled. When Duo was ready, Heero removed his fingers and moved between Duo's legs.

Duo lifted his knees as if he were confident, but when he felt Heero against him, poised, he whispered in worry, "Careful."

"Always," Heero promised and then slowly and carefully began sheathing himself into Duo's tight heat.

It wasn't perfect, at first, and it wasn't without some pain, fumbling, and mistakes, but, when they were finally moving together and the pleasure replaced uncertainty, it seemed perfection itself. It was more than the act, more than quenching need, and more than about bodies. It was an affirmation, a promise, and a commitment that was sealed when they both reached the pinnacle of sensation together and came explosively.

Afterward, as they lay together in the afterglow, and stared up at the curve of the city above them, Heero asked, "All right?"

Duo nodded against his shoulder. "Yeah... just tired... and sore. " He slowly smiled, wide and pleased. "Heero, we just did it, for our first time, where every freakin person on this station could get a peak."

Heero blinked as his mind began to work again and tell him the same thing. Heero smirked and held Duo closer. "We're alone," he told Duo as he rolled to face him. "This is our place."

Duo eyed him and then laughed. "Denial can be a wonderful thing." He hooked a leg over Heero and then moved on top of him, looking down into his eyes, still smiling. "Okay, so we're alone, in our place, making love between the earth and the sky. What comes next? What happens when you come down from that adrenalin high and you realize..."

"And you realize that you're with a man who killed people when he was four years old, who assassinated without a bit of emotion, who destroyed an entire ship of peace delegates, who single handedly killed thousands in a war, " Heero countered. "I never had a home, parents, or any friends except my weapons."

Duo looked pained and then he pressed himself full length against Heero. He whispered against his neck, "The past is the past, I guess."

"Yes.," Heero replied as he wrapped arms around Duo. "That's when we were children."

"But now we know what we want," Duo said. "And we have it, so..."

"We're adults," Heero finished. "We'll make a future together and leave the past where it is."

Duo nuzzled Heero's neck, but his voice was serious as he said, "We are what we are, Heero. You can't leave that behind."

Heero caressed Duo's face. "I don't want to. You're everything that I've always wanted."

"I snore," Duo pointed out skeptically, "I don't cook that well, and I'm kind of bad about that whole 'living within society's rules', thing."

Heero looked at him with a gentle smile.

Duo arched an eyebrow. "Well?"

Heero arched an eyebrow back. "Well?"

"I suppose you don't have any faults?" Duo groused.

Heero pretended to think. "No," he finally replied.

"Bastard!" Duo laughed. "I'll have to give you some, then."

Heero held him close and said in his hair as he enjoyed the feel of Duo against him, "I'll take anything that you wish to give."

Duo's pelvis pressed against him. "Anything?"

Heero smiled. "Anything."

"I think I'll start with my love, then, "Duo replied as he moved Heero's knees apart and slid between them.."And then things'll get interesting..."

End

see Kracken's original, published yaoi fiction, The Angel Within, at under Kracken Website:http:kracken. Latest updates at: http:groups. for general fanfiction talk: http:groups. 


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